SECRET DOCUMENT DETAILS PROCEDURES THE NSA IS REQUIRED TO FOLLOW TO TARGET “NON-US PERSONS” UNDER ITS FOREIGN INTELLIGENCE POWERS – AND WHAT THE AGENCY DOES TO MINIMIZE DATA COLLECTED ON US CITIZENS AND RESIDENTS (Story/Guardian)

Another case in our series of articles about WikiLeaks documents used in a trial. Published in UK Human Right Blogs on January 30, 2013 by David Hart, under the title: EU Court annuls EU freezing orders on Iranian bank – and Wikileaks again Bank Mellat v Council of the European Union (supported by EU Commission), EU General Court, 29 January 2013 (read…

By SW Radio Africa – Alex Bell – 28 January 2013. In this case, the documents were not exactly used in courts as a proof in a lawsuit, but were the starting point of a defamation trial. Original Title: African Consolidated Resources a ‘sacrificial lamb’ after losing WikiLeaks case. The head of a former Chiadzwa based mining company, who…

Daily News January 12, 2013 (In this case, the use of Wikileaks documents has been refused.) The Ankara Chief Prosecutor’s Office dismissed a complaint on Jan. 11 concerning Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdo?an’s alleged improper benefit from eight accounts with Swiss banks. The claims were based on cables released by the whistle-blowing website WikiLeaks. “Attributing evidence value to documents that…

published by the Guardian on Wednesday 25 July 2012 under the title: Judge orders cross-examination of officials over WikiLeaks documents A top judge has taken the unprecedented step of ordering two senior government officials to face cross-examination in court over a classified US document leaked by WikiLeaks. It is thought to be the first time that one of the WikiLeaks…

Article published on Huffington post by Angela Charlton onDecember13th,2012 under the title: Khaled El-Masri, German Allegedly Kidnapped By CIA In Afghanistan, Wins Case PARIS — A European court issued a landmark ruling Thursday that condemned the CIA’s “extraordinary renditions” programs and bolstered those who say they were illegally kidnapped and tortured as part of an overzealous war on terrorism….

Only one month into the Occupy Wall Street demonstrations last year, plans were formulated to identify key figures in the movement and execute them with a coordinated assault using sniper rifles, new documents reveal.

The revelation — discussed in a heavily redacted FBI memo unearthed late last month through a Freedom of Information Act request — reveals that the Federal Bureau of Investigation was aware of plans for a violent assault on the peaceful protest movement but stayed silent on rumors of an assassination attempt only until now.

Information on the alleged plot to kill off protesters appears on page 61 of the trove of documents obtained recently by a FOIA request filed by the Partnership For Civil Justice Fund. On the page in question, marked “SECRET,” the FBI acknowledges:

An identified [redacted] of October planned to engage in sniper attacks against protesters in Houston, Texas, if deemed necessary. An identified [redacted] had received intelligence that indicated the protesters in New York and Seattle planned similar protests in Houston, Dallas, San Antonio and Austin, Texas. [Redacted] planned to gather intelligence against the leaders of the protest groups and obtain photographs then formulate a plan to kill the leadership via suppressed sniper rifles.

Throughout the rest of the material obtained by the PFCJF, the FBI declines to mention any follow-up attempts at investigating or handling the rumored assassination plot. Page 61, where the plot is discussed, was redacted heavily before handed over to the PFCJF.

As RT reported when the documents were first published just before Christmas, other material released through the FOIA request shows the FBI and other law enforcement agencies labeling Occupy activists as criminal and domestic terrorists right from the early days of their anti-capitalism and anti-corporate greed protests that began in September 2011.

“These documents show that the FBI and the Department of Homeland Security are treating protests against the corporate and banking structure of America as potential criminal and terrorist activity,” PFCJF Executive Director Mara Verheyden-Hilliard says. “These documents also show these federal agencies functioning as a de facto intelligence arm of Wall Street and Corporate America.”

But while police agencies were working to expose protesters for alleged crimes against the country, the demonstrators themselves were being faced with very real death threats.

“The documents, released after long delay in the week between Christmas and New Years, show a nationwide meta-plot unfolding in city after city in an Orwellian world,” Naomi Wolf writes for The Guardian. Not all that unsurprising, though, is how the very agencies that acted to suppress the protest movement made little announcement of plans to execute the very people involved in the group.

“[T]hreats of the assassination of OWS leaders by sniper fire — by whom? Where? — now remain redacted and undisclosed to those American citizens in danger, contrary to standard FBI practice to inform the person concerned when there is a threat against a political leader,” Wolf writes.

Commenting on the trove of documents, The New York Times reports, “The records show little evidence that the members of the movement planned to commit violence.”

Truthout‘s Jason Leopold on RT’s The Big Picture discussing recent FOIA documents released by the FBI, that reveal heavy surveillance of Occupy Wall Street protesters, them being labelled as ” domestic terrorists” by the department, and also redacted reports of a person/group planning sniper rifle assassinations of Occupy leaders.

Documents published over the weekend, show inner-office communiqué that confirms investigators were considering Occupy demonstrators in some instances as criminals and domestic terrorists.

Mara Verheyden-Hilliard, the executive director of the PCJF, writes in a statement this week that the initial 100-plus pages obtained through the FOIA request are “just the tip of the iceberg” of what’s expected to be a substantial trove of data proving that the FBI was actively monitoring activists.

The list of documents, says Verheyden-Hilliard, “is a window into the nationwide scope of the FBI’s surveillance, monitoring, and reporting on peaceful protestors organizing with the Occupy movement.”

“These documents show that the FBI and the Department of Homeland Security are treating protests against the corporate and banking structure of America as potential criminal and terrorist activity,” she writes. “These documents also show these federal agencies functioning as a de facto intelligence arm of Wall Street and Corporate America.”

Even before the first occupiers erected tents in Zuccotti Park, the FBI was well involved in investigating the group.

“As early as August 19, 2011, the FBI in New York was meeting with the New York Stock Exchange to discuss the Occupy Wall Street protests that wouldn’t start for another month,” the PCJF writes. “By September, prior to the start of the OWS, the FBI was notifying businesses that they might be the focus of an OWS protest.”

In another document, the Indianapolis, Indiana division of the FBI released a “Potential Criminal Activity Alert” about the protests two days before they even started in New York, let alone spread to the Midwest.

In other locales across the country, the FBI alerted authorities to potential criminal and terrorism activity from the protesters and asked them to monitor the movement of the group.

The trove of information received through the FOIA requests is perhaps the most substantial proof so far that the FBI was thoroughly vested in treating Occupy Wall Street as a form of terrorism. It isn’t however, the first evidence used to prove that peaceful protesters aligned with OWS were on the FBI’s radar. In September, the American Civil Liberties Union received documents obtained through their own FOIA request showing that Occupy activists in Northern California were routinely targeted by federal agents.

“Why does a political protest amount to a national security threat?” ACLU attorney Linda Lye asked at the time.

Pages 60/68/69 of the latest FOIA release also contain documents with some shocking information. They mention sniper rifle assassination plots against Occupy activists in Houston, Texas. Because the documents have redactions, it is not clear who or what group was planning the assassinations.